


First day of summer, 1981

by angelica_church_schuyler



Category: Arrested Development
Genre: (but really no more than what's in the actual show), Actually quite a bit of family angst for Gob, Gen, Gratuitous piano, Possible warning for child neglect, Screenplay/Script Format, Some slight family angst, family fic, sibling relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-14
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-23 07:59:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14930321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelica_church_schuyler/pseuds/angelica_church_schuyler
Summary: It's the first day of summer in 1981, and the Bluth family have just arrived at their beach house for summer vacation. A very short peek into what that day was like.Written in script format as a flashback. Narrated by Ron Howard.





	First day of summer, 1981

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! I actually really enjoyed writing this. Scripts are way more my comfort zone. I've been writing little scripts since I was about 10 so this was fun for me.  
> A note on character ages: I used a post on the AD subreddit with rough age guesses to figure out how old the kids would be. This fic is set in 1981, and the Bluth kids ages are as follows:  
> G.O.B: 14  
> Lindsay: 15 but thinks she's 12  
> Michael: Actually 12  
> Buster: 8  
> I'll tell you about my process for figuring this out in my notes at the end. Let me know in the comments if you think my maths was wrong. Maths is not my strong suit.  
> Music I listened to and that I strongly encourage you also listen to while reading:  
> Sound of Silence piano cover: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Mk2V9xQpoM  
> Somewhere Over The Rainbow piano cover: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4xDlAkkhHM

We open on a shot of a large house - it's not quite a mansion, but it's pretty damn close - by the beach. This is the Bluth family summer home. It’s the first day of summer vacation, 1981, and the Bluth family are just arriving and beginning to unpack for the summer.

NARRATOR  
This is a beach house in Orange County, California, in 1981. Yes, this is a flashback. We’re doing that now. Deal with it.

The camera cuts to a panning shot of the not-quite-a-mansion’s living room. We hear a piano, playing a song that should be familiar to the audience. It’s the opening bars of The Sound of Silence. 

The camera lands on a teenage boy playing a modest but still expensive looking piano.

Freeze-frame.

NARRATOR

This is G.O.B BLUTH. He's 14 years old here, and has big dreams of being a concert pianist. These dreams, however, clash with his inability to imagine himself living past 18 years old due to a severe case of depression that will remain undiagnosed even in his adulthood.

Unfreeze. Now that the narrator points it out, G.O.B does look kinda sad. He still has the flamboyance and natural showmanship of the adult G.O.B the audience knows, but with an added little bit of teen angst and hormones. 

We cut to the bottom of the stairs. A young girl is walking down them.

LINDSAY  
Mom says shut up, you're giving her a headache.

Freeze-frame again.  


NARRATOR  
This is LINDSAY BLUTH. At this point in time, she believes herself to be a 12 year old girl a few years ahead of the developmental curve. In reality, she is 15 and slightly behind developmentally. Her hair is big. Her self-esteem issues are bigger.

Again, LINDSAY simply appears to be a not-quite-finished version of her older self. However, beneath her air of self-confidence and meticulously styled 80s hairdo, she's a self-conscious mess.

Unfreeze. A boy, supposedly the same age as LINDSAY but obviously younger, comes bolting down the stairs, full of nervous energy.He is dressed in the yellow uniform we'll later come to associate with his son.  
Freeze.  


NARRATOR  
This is MICHAEL BLUTH. At 12, Michael is already a pretty put-together guy. But it should be noted that this is because of overwhelming pressure from his parents, and it’s bound to cause him to snap at some point. This is his first summer as manager of the Bluth empire banana stand, so his breaking point is most likely approaching sooner than he expects.

Cut back to 12 year old MICHAEL.  
Unfreeze.

MICHAEL (overflowing with excitement; slight hints of George Michael-esque teen awkwardness and earnestness in his voice; talking to no one in particular)  
Oh my god. Okay. Manager! Wow! Oh god I'm so excited. This is gonna be great.

Pause. 

MICHAEL (suddenly more nervous than excited)  
This is gonna be great. Right, Linds?

__

LINDSAY is reclining on a couch, looking at the pictures in a fashion magazine.

LINDSAY (uninterested)  
Sure.

G.O.B is paying some attention to the conversation, but paying more attention to the piano.  


G.O.B  
Shut up, Michael, no one cares.

LINDSAY  
Yeah, shut up Michael.

MICHAEL  
(mocking) Shut up Michael!

NARRATOR  
Even decades later, MICHAEL would lay in bed and wish he'd had a better comeback. 

MICHAEL sits on the other side of LINDSAY’s couch, glaring at G.O.B and fiddling with his name badge.

LINDSAY (to G.O.B)  
Didn't I tell you to quit it with the piano? Have you even started unpacking yet?

G.O.B  
Yes and no.

LINDSAY just rolls her eyes as G.O.B continues playing.

A door opens offscreen, and into the shot walks an exhausted but still perfectly made-up LUCILLE BLUTH. LUCILLE has huge shades on her eyes and a small boy clinging to her leg.  
Zoom in and freeze-frame on BUSTER, 8 years old. A tiny first draft of the manchild we've come to love.

NARRATOR  
And finally, 8 year old BUSTER. BUSTER is young enough that he doesn’t know he needs glasses, his attachment to his mother is just cute rather than vaguely horrifying, and he still likes his family. What a poor, naïve little child.

Unfreeze. BUSTER opens his mouth to speak. But before he can.

LUCILLE  
Didn't LINDSAY tell you I told you to stop that?

G.O.B  
Yup.

LUCILLE  
Well, why are you still doing it?

G.O.B  
Didn't feel like stopping.

NARRATOR  
After 14 years of parenting, LUCILLE had started picking her battles.

LUCILLE  
Well at least play something better.

G.O.B  
Something better? Like what?

LUCILLE  
Like...oh, I don't know...some old Broadway standard or something. I'm going back to bed. Ugh, I have the most awful headache.

G.O.B begins to fake cough.

G.O.B  
(Between clearly staged coughs) Hangover! (Very dramatic, very fake coughing fit)

LUCILLE stares at him. Perhaps 'glare' is the better word. A Medusa-like glare.

G.O.B finishes coughing.

G.O.B  
Sorry. Must be the dust.

LUCILLE makes a ‘hmph’-ing noise before retreating upstairs to her room. The camera follows BUSTER who has detached himself from her leg and settled between MICHAEL and LINDSAY on the couch. MICHAEL’s leg is bouncing nervously. LINDSAY is focused on her magazine and doesn't seem to have noticed anything that's happened in the past few minutes until BUSTER climbs onto the couch.

Cut back to G.O.B. He stares at the piano for a beat before launching into a rendition of ‘Somewhere Over The Rainbow’, the only “old Broadway standard” he knows.

Very suddenly, the camera cuts to the front door as GEORGE Sr. comes barrelling through it. BUSTER startles at the noise. G.O.B stops playing. MICHAEL jumps to his feet.

GEORGE Sr.  
You’re ready to go?

MICHAEL  
You bet I am.

G.O.B resumes ‘Over The Rainbow’. BUSTER begins swaying and humming along to the music.

GEORGE Sr.  
Wow. You’re enthusiastic. I only wish some of my other employees could be like you!

NARRATOR  
By “employees”, he really meant “children”. And by “children”, he meant “G.O.B.”

GEORGE Sr.  
(acknowledging G.O.B for the first time)  
God, who requested that song? Hey, if you’re gonna keep doing that, could you play something a little less...y'know...queer?

G.O.B abruptly slams the piano lid shut, narrowly avoiding his own fingertips. He walks, maybe a little bit too quickly, towards the stairs. BUSTER is visibly disappointed by the loss of the music. LINDSAY, true to form, hasn’t noticed anything.

G.O.B  
(now offscreen)  
I’ll be in my room. 

GEORGE Sr. shakes his head.

GEORGE Sr.  
He’s so dramatic. I have no idea where he gets it from.

We hear LUCILLE in the other room, moaning with pain from her “headache”.

LUCILLE (offscreen)  
Good lord, I think I’m dying!

__

We cut to little BUSTER, looking worried and just a bit too young to understand hyperbole.

BUSTER  
Mommy’s dying?

LINDSAY  
(looking up for the first time and resting her hand over BUSTER’s)  
She’s fine, she’s exaggerating.

G.O.B has finally started unpacking. It’s happening offscreen, but we know it’s happening because if we listen really hard we can hear an old record player upstairs playing ‘Sound of Silence’. 

Cut back to MICHAEL and GEORGE Sr. 

GEORGE Sr.  
Okay, Mr Manager. Think you’re ready?

MICHAEL  
(with newfound confidence) Yeah. Yeah, I think I am.

GEORGE Sr.  
You better be.

NARRATOR  
That summer was an eventful one for the Bluth family, but we don’t have time to go into that now. For now, we go back to the present.

As the Narrator speaks we see LINDSAY put down her magazine and offer BUSTER a juice box. He graciously accepts, bouncing up and down on the couch.

GEORGE Sr. puts his hand on MICHAEL’s shoulder and the two of them walk out the front door together, smiling. 

A grainy recording of the ‘Sound of Silence’ continues to play, slowly getting louder as the camera fades out.

FIN

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed reading that as much as I enjoyed writing it. Can you tell Gob and Buster are my favourite Bluths?
> 
> So according to the post I referred to for character ages, Michael and Buster are 36 and 32 respectively in season 3. This makes Gob about 38 and Lindsay 39. Season 3 premiered in 2005, so from there I figured out that Lindsay was born in 1966, Gob in 1967, Michael in 1969, and Buster in 1973, giving them their respective ages in this fic. Again, let me know if I've messed up because I am a really fucking shitty mathematician.
> 
> I love every single person who even clicks on this fic, thank you! And remember: there's always money in the banana stand.


End file.
